How it works: Fourteen balls numbered 1-14 will be placed in a lottery machine and mixed. Four balls will then be drawn to the top to determine a four-digit combination. The team that has been assigned that four-ball combination will receive the No. 1 pick. The four balls will then be placed back into the machine and the process will be repeated to determine the second and third picks. The team that does not win one of the top three picks will be slotted fourth.

There are 1,001 possible combinations when four balls are drawn out of 14, without regard to their order of selection. One thousand of those combinations will be assigned to the four non-playoff teams based on their order of finish in the 2012 regular season. The remaining combination will be unassigned. If the one unassigned combination is drawn, the balls will be placed back into the machine and the process will be repeated until an assigned combination is drawn.

The top prizes

The three best college players expected be chosen among the first three picks of the 2013 WNBA draft in April.

Brittney Griner

College: Baylor.

Position: Center.

Height: 6-8.

The intrigue: Griner is expected to be chosen first overall in the 2013 WNBA draft. As a junior last season, she won every national Player of the Year award and was a consensus first-team All-American after leading Baylor to a 40-0 record and the NCAA championship. She averaged 23.2 points and 9.5 rebounds per game and led the nation with 206 blocks. She is 35 rebounds shy of becoming the first player in NCAA history to score more than 2,000 points, grab more than 1,000 rebounds and block more than 500 shots.

Elena Delle Donne

College: Delaware.

Position: Forward/guard.

Height: 6-5.

The intrigue: Delle Donne is expected to be chosen second overall in the 2013 WNBA draft. She was a consensus first-team All-American and led the nation in scoring last season at 28.1 points per game.Delle Donne made headlines in 2008 when, after graduating high school as the nation's top prep player, she decided to walk away from a scholarship to Connecticut and quit basketball, citing burnout.Delle Donne played volleyball at Delaware for one season before deciding to play basketball again in 2009.

Skylar Diggins

College: Notre Dame.

Position: Point guard.

Height: 5-9.

The intrigue: Diggins is expected be chosen third overall in the 2013 WNBA draft. She was a consensus first-team All-American as a junior and earned the Nancy Lieberman Award as the nation's top point guard. She led Notre Dame to the 2011 NCAA Women's Tournament championship game.Diggins is known to change hairstyles during halftimes of games depending on what kind of game she is having.

By Odeen Domingoazcentral sportsWed Sep 26, 2012 11:01 AM

The Mercury's 2012 season ended Sunday, finishing last in the WNBA Western Conference with a 7-27 record. It was the worst season ever in franchise history.

And yet, the biggest consolation prize may still elude them.

By all accounts, Baylor's 6-foot-8 phenom Brittney Griner is a once-in-a-generation game changer. This decade's Ann Meyers. Or Cheryl Miller. And she is waiting to be picked No.1 in next April's WNBA draft.

But which team will have the privilege to do that has yet to be determined. Despite a horrid season, it may not be the Mercury.

You can thank the WNBA's draft lottery.

The Mercury along with the league's three other non-playoff teams will be hoping to score the top pick by chance in the lottery, which commences in ESPN's studios in Bristol, Conn. at 3 p.m. Wednesday. ESPN will broadcast the event live. By virtue of finishing with the league's second-worst record, the Mercury have the second-best chance (27.6 percent) at the No.1 draft pick. The Washington Mystics, who finished 5-29, have the best chance (44.2 percent). The Tulsa Shock (9-25) have a 17.8-percent chance and the Chicago Sky (14-20) have a 10.4-percent chance.

It may just be the most anticipated WNBA draft lottery event since the league instituted it before the 2002 season. The league even moved up the date of the 2012 lottery. Last season, the lottery didn't happen until November.

“I think the top three picks, specifically, can have major impacts on one of the four teams in the lottery, they all bring a dynamic aspect,” ESPN's WNBA analyst, Carolyn Peck, told azcentral sports. “But Brittney Griner is unlike anyone in the country.

“Usually when a player is 6-8, that counts against them with their foot speed. Either they're slow or lazy. You're not going to get any of that from Griner. She is high energy and runs the floor and she can jump. She brings the dunk to the women's game like Candace Parker, Sylvia Fowles and Lisa Leslie did. She brings excitement to the game.”

A player like Griner is the exact reason the draft lottery is in place. It is supposed to prevent teams from tanking a season and automatically being able to pick first in the following college-player draft.

The Minnesota Lynx have benefited from the lottery. It won the first pick of the 2006 draft despite having the third-best chance of doing so. The team used that pick to choose Seimone Augustus. The Lynx had the worst odds for the 2011 draft’s first pick but won it and chose Maya Moore. Now both players are major components of the league's defending champs and best team.

“Obviously, fairness depends on what side of the street you're standing on,” Griffith said. “We've gotten lucky in the lottery. But people forget that at times, it went in the other direction for us. You just have to let the chips fall where they may. It is what it is. It's exciting for fans and for the four cities that are a part of it.”

The 2009 WNBA draft lottery was the only one in the event's history that went according to the odds. The 2011 draft lottery went the exact opposite direction to the odds.

The team with the best odds won the first pick in the lottery three times in the past 10 years. The same goes for the team with the second-best odds, which the Mercury have heading into Wednesday's event. If the trend holds, the Mercury have just as much chance at the No.1 pick as any of the other teams.

The No. 2 pick isn't a bad spot, either. The second-player expected to be chosen in April's draft is Delaware's Elena Delle Donne, a 6-foot-5 sharpshooter who can score from anywhere.

“I think Elena would fit best with Phoenix,” Peck said. “In their offensive system, they really need to have someone who has a 3-point shot. She doesn't have to shoot the ball but just to be a threat and spread the offense. You can't go wrong with either of the (No.1 or No.2) picks."

The third pick will likely be Notre Dame point guard Skylar Diggins. If the Mercury fall there, they will have a choice to make. The team chose Ohio State point guard Samantha Prahalis in the first round last year, and she has developed well in her first year. But Diggins would have been the first guard taken if she was eligible in last year's draft.

Then there's the chance the Mercury may miss out on all of the first three picks. After Griner, Delle Donne and Diggins, there is a significant drop in talent with the rest of the field.

Mercury coach and General Manager Corey Gaines isn't worried. He already has a team full of stars in DeWanna Bonner, Candice Dupree, Diana Taurasi and Penny Taylor. If all of them are healthy next season, whoever the Mercury are able to draft next year will only add to the team's abundance of talent.

“I want the players to get healthy first,” Gaines said. “But either way, (next year) will definitely be something special.”

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